I mean, although it wasn't by voting, technically, the USSR was birthed out of the destruction of the provisional, nominally liberal gov't of Russia, led by Kerensky....
this post was submitted on 21 Aug 2024
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Not really (with maybe the exception of east germany, but not through any internal revolution, but dragged into socialism by the USSR after WW2). Every country that became socialist was previously a feudal monarchy, and largely produced an agricultural surplus.
One of Lenin's major correction's to Marx and Engels, was that capitalism does not break in it's birthplaces, where capitalism is most entrenched, but in the weakest links in the chain, where capitalist industry and power is still in a precarious position.
This was the case in Russia, China, Cuba, DPRK, Vietnam, Laos, - etc. Peasants formed the base of the revolutionary armies, and they fought kulaks/landlords, and other whites.
Old comment about this:
Start MoP -> | End | Examples
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Clan | Socialist | Mongolia Clan | Feudal | Germany Clan | Slave | West Africa Slave | Capitalist | US Feudal | Capitalist | Western Europe Feudal | Socialist | USSR, China, DPRK, Vietnam, Cuba Capitalist | Socialist | East Germany Socialist | Capitalist | USSR Feudal | Slave | Roman Republic Slave | Feudal | Late Roman Empire (Colonate)
Note:
- Marx and Engels wrong abt birthplaces transition.
- Almost every one of these transitions came through war.
- The most common socialist transition is not from capitalist -> socialist, but feudal -> socialist
Also to your point, if there is a list of countries most likely to have a revolution, IMO the US would be dead last on the list. Far more likely would be a few countries taking the socialist road in South America, and Africa. Also possibly Russia, which some comrades have commented on.
Technically Russia was under a short lived liberal provisional government when the Bolshevik revolution happened and not the Tsar's regime. The Spanish Civil war is a strange case where both a fascist insurgency and a socialist revolution broke out from a liberal government at the same time, unfortunately the fascists ended up coming out on top there. China too is kinda similar where both the CPC and Chiang's nationalists splintered out from the liberal Beiyang government.
I also didn't realize Spain had a liberal government before the Civil War. I guess I always figured it was a monarchy like everywhere else, but a quick read on Wikipedia shows it was a democratic liberal government and the monarchy was deposed 5 or so years earlier. Thanks for that interesting fact and unique case.
Between this and the Russia example, I wonder if the beginning of a liberal bourgeois democracy is it at its weakest. Socialism feels so hopeless now in the US, with how strong and entrenched it's liberal bourgeois institutions are now. But then the Roman Republic fell after hundreds of years, and we haven't really had capitalism that long yet, so maybe it's possible with the right conditions.
I don't believe that the Beiyang government warrants the term liberal, if I'm being honest... what justifies the label?
it hardly even warrants the term government either
Africa;
Angola and Burkina Faso.
The Angolan revolution happened while they where trying to institute liberal democracy (by torturing and raping for there colonial masters)
So far it appears, around the world, self-proclaimed communist parties that engage in electoralism subsequently are hampered by the constraints of bourgois democracy. I would be happy to be given examples that prove otherwise.
chile? venezula? (while i hear venezula isn't a full out socialist, they are defying the us hegemony with a tint of communism because to be communist/full socialist would scare the national bougiouse [what i hear atleast])
In those countries the lack of democratic centralism is plain to see and if one is fearing bourgois sentiments then a significant authority of power still resides in the parasitic classes with all the failings that structure brings. The dictatorship of the proleteriat is a necessity to advance social development; it is hard enough battling imperialist and fascist forces let alone concede space for their "freedom of expression" with the weight of brutalising capital behind them.
Edit: clarity/grammar
Czar Nicholas and his Romanov dynasty were pretty damn liberal in pre-Soviet Russia, up to and including him spending most of his time doing foreign tourism, playing tennis, and sending his soldiers off to die for trivial reasons.
The western powers saw him as some grand cosmopolitan "reform" czar that was giving them what they wanted until that Great War thing.
Russia wasn't a liberal country, it was a feudal monarchy, and the transition was from feudalism -> socialism, with peasants forming the basis of the revolutionary army (same for China, Vietnam, DPRK, etc). See my other comment but so far there hasn't been any historical case (besides the USSR dragging east germany into socialism) of a capitalist -> socialist transition.
I may have used the term too loosely, but at the time, the western powers did see Nicholas II as some enlightened "reasonable" cosmopolitan reformist that they could shape like clay.